Advanced Digital Forensic Solutions, Inc. (ADF Solutions) is a company based in Reston, Virginia, that develops tools for scanning suspect computers and digital devices to locate and extract data, a process known as digital forensics. [1] Digital forensic tools scan mobile phones, computers and digital devices to collect intelligence or evidence of a crime to identify computers that contain content relevant to an investigation.
Triage-G2 is a media exploitation (MEDEX) tool used on computers and peripheral devices. It is typically deployed on a USB device by military personnel working in the field. The USB devices, known as triage keys, can be prepared in advance or in the field by selecting specific search criteria. The users of this tool do not require significant technical computer skills. Triage-G2 is currently in use by several U.S. Defense and Intelligence agencies. [2] [3]
Digital Evidence Investigator is a forensic triage tool used on computers by forensic examiners in lab environments, or on location, to scan suspect devices and prioritize them for full examinations. Digital Evidence Investigator is in use by law enforcement agencies worldwide. [4] [5] [6]
Document and media exploitation (DOMEX) is defined as the extraction, translation, and analysis of physical and digital documents and media to generate useful and timely information. [7]
Forensic science, also known as criminalistics, is the application of science principles and methods to support legal decision-making in matters of criminal and civil law.
Computer forensics is a branch of digital forensic science pertaining to evidence found in computers and digital storage media. The goal of computer forensics is to examine digital media in a forensically sound manner with the aim of identifying, preserving, recovering, analyzing, and presenting facts and opinions about the digital information.
The United States National Drug Intelligence Center (NDIC), established in 1993, was a component of the U.S. Department of Justice and a member of the Intelligence Community. The General Counterdrug Intelligence Plan, implemented in February 2000, designated NDIC as the nation's principal center for strategic domestic counterdrug intelligence.
Digital forensics is a branch of forensic science encompassing the recovery, investigation, examination, and analysis of material found in digital devices, often in relation to mobile devices and computer crime. The term "digital forensics" was originally used as a synonym for computer forensics but has expanded to cover investigation of all devices capable of storing digital data. With roots in the personal computing revolution of the late 1970s and early 1980s, the discipline evolved in a haphazard manner during the 1990s, and it was not until the early 21st century that national policies emerged.
IsoBuster is a data recovery computer program by Smart Projects, a Belgian company founded in 1995 by Peter Van Hove. As of version 3.0, it can recover data from damaged file systems or physically damaged disks including optical discs, hard disk drives, USB flash drives and solid-state disks. It has the ability to access "deleted" data on multisession optical discs, and allows users to access disc images and to extract files in the same way that they would from a ZIP archive. IsoBuster is also often used by law enforcement and data forensics experts.
Anti–computer forensics or counter-forensics are techniques used to obstruct forensic analysis.
BasisTech is a software company specializing in applying artificial intelligence techniques to understanding documents and unstructured data written in different languages. It has headquarters in Somerville, Massachusetts with a subsidiary office in Tokyo. Its legal name is BasisTech LLC.
EnCase is the shared technology within a suite of digital investigations products by Guidance Software. The software comes in several products designed for forensic, cyber security, security analytics, and e-discovery use. EnCase is traditionally used in forensics to recover evidence from seized hard drives. It allows the investigator to conduct in-depth analysis of user files to collect evidence such as documents, pictures, internet history and Windows Registry information.
Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor (COFEE) is a tool kit, developed by Microsoft, to help computer forensic investigators extract evidence from a Windows computer. Installed on a USB flash drive or other external disk drive, it acts as an automated forensic tool during a live analysis. Microsoft provides COFEE devices and online technical support free to law enforcement agencies.
Cyber espionage, cyber spying, or cyber-collection is the act or practice of obtaining secrets and information without the permission and knowledge of the holder of the information using methods on the Internet, networks or individual computers through the use of proxy servers, cracking techniques and malicious software including Trojan horses and spyware. Cyber espionage can be used to target various actors- individuals, competitors, rivals, groups, governments, and others- in order to obtain personal, economic, political or military advantages. It may wholly be perpetrated online from computer desks of professionals on bases in far away countries or may involve infiltration at home by computer trained conventional spies and moles or in other cases may be the criminal handiwork of amateur malicious hackers and software programmers.
Mobile device forensics is a branch of digital forensics relating to recovery of digital evidence or data from a mobile device under forensically sound conditions. The phrase mobile device usually refers to mobile phones; however, it can also relate to any digital device that has both internal memory and communication ability, including PDA devices, GPS devices and tablet computers.
The digital forensic process is a recognized scientific and forensic process used in digital forensics investigations. Forensics researcher Eoghan Casey defines it as a number of steps from the original incident alert through to reporting of findings. The process is predominantly used in computer and mobile forensic investigations and consists of three steps: acquisition, analysis and reporting.
Cellebrite DI Ltd. is a digital intelligence company headquartered in Petah Tikva, Israel, that provides tools for law enforcement agencies as well as enterprise companies and service providers to collect, review, analyze and manage digital data. Their flagship product series is the Cellebrite UFED.
Guidance Software, Inc. was a publicly traded company founded in 1997 by Shawn McCreight. Headquartered in Pasadena, California, the company developed and provided software solutions for digital investigations primarily in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia/Pacific Rim. Guidance Software had offices in Brazil, Chicago, Houston, New York City, San Francisco, Singapore, United Kingdom and Washington, D.C., and employed approximately 371 employees. On September 14, 2017, the company was acquired by OpenText.
The Science and Technology Branch (STB) is a service within the Federal Bureau of Investigation that comprises three separate divisions and three program offices. The goal when it was founded in July 2006 was to centralize the leadership and management of the three divisions. The mission of the STB is discover, develop, and deliver innovative science and technology so that intelligence and innovative investigation is enhanced.
Forensic search is an emerging field of computer forensics. Forensic search focuses on user created data such as email files, cell phone records, office documents, PDFs and other files that are easily interpreted by a person.
USBKill is anti-forensic software distributed via GitHub, written in Python for the BSD, Linux, and OS X operating systems. It is designed to serve as a kill switch if the computer on which it is installed should fall under the control of individuals or entities against the desires of the owner. It is free software, available under the GNU General Public License.
Vault 7 is a series of documents that WikiLeaks began to publish on 7 March 2017, detailing the activities and capabilities of the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to perform electronic surveillance and cyber warfare. The files, dating from 2013 to 2016, include details on the agency's software capabilities, such as the ability to compromise cars, smart TVs, web browsers including Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Mozilla Firefox, and Opera, the operating systems of most smartphones including Apple's iOS and Google's Android, and computer operating systems including Microsoft Windows, macOS, and Linux. A CIA internal audit identified 91 malware tools out of more than 500 tools in use in 2016 being compromised by the release. The tools were developed by the Operations Support Branch of the CIA.
The UFED is a product series of the Israeli company Cellebrite, which is used for the extraction and analysis of data from mobile devices by law enforcement agencies.